Gannett Company founder Frank Gannett
Obviously, we must save the newspaper industry. There’s no free and robust public debate without reporting, and there’s no reporting without pulping trees, printing stories on them and driving those broadsheets around the country. Websites are no substitute. Okay—they’re a substitute in that they’re putting print news out of business, but that doesn’t mean we could get the same journalism without physical distribution. It’s called the newspaper, not the news writers, and for that reason the paper itself must survive. That’s why the Great Falls Tribune has reorganized its newsroom and laid off John S. Adams, the best political reporter in Montana. It’s also why Gannett—owner of the Tribune and the Newsquest family of papers in the UK—has a new plan to charge journalism students to write for its publications.